Wednesday, April 11, 2012

The path forward...

I've been back in England for over a week now. Jet-lag has finally diminished, but my intense joy in being home in the Devon hills remains just as strong as ever -- so much so that even the chilly, changeable weather of recent days can't dull my spirits. I've returned to my old practice of beginning each morning in the woods behind the studio, with a notebook and a thermos of coffee close to hand and Tilly the Wonder Dog at my side. (The painting below, by my friend and village neighbor David Wyatt, captures such mornings perfectly...and I should mention that he has many lovely prints for sale, including this one, in his Etsy shop.)

Settling back into my studio, I've been taking blunt stock of the ways that six months of coping with crisis has impacted my working life -- taking a deep breath and facing all of those things that were pushed to the back burner while I was dealing with Scary Life Stuff instead. The length of my "To Do" list is a bit scary in itself, as such lists always are après-crisis -- which is of course precisely the time when, flummoxed by all that you've just been through, what you want is for life to be simple and calm (or else to lie on a hot beach somewhere in the Carribean)...not to have to face the dust and cobwebs covering the negelected life to which you are returning. But as someone who has re-built my life more than once (due to health problems in the past), I know that this small mountain of things I now have to do, although daunting, is actually a very good sign: it's the very last hurdle before normal life resumes. And that's a fine goal indeed.

At least my mountain is made up of largely interesting things: writing and editing work to catch up on, e-book rights and texts to sort out, art commissions to finish for people who have been very, very patient for far too long. I have an Etsy shop to stock up again, a great deal of backed-up correspondence to respond do, and some lovely new projects to plot and plan (which I will tell you more about in due time)...while also finding a proper work/life balance that can support fragile (but strengthening!) health and keep the Muse (and the pooch!) well fed.

I know many of you cope with the same things too: the balancing act that a creative life requires -- balancing work needs and health needs and family needs and the soul's contrary need for both community and solitude. Back around Christmas, I read an article suggesting that the very best gift that one can give to a writer or artist is the precious gift of time...and that's a lovely idea, but I think we also need to be able to give ourselves that gift. For many of us, that means saying shush to the voices (usually inner rather than outer) insisting that others deserve our time more than we do, and that only when everything else is done may we retreat from the world and plunge into our art. Yes, there are times in life when unstinting selflessness is required from each of us...but there are also times when self-fullness (to invent a term that's less loaded than "selfishness") is what is needed most: for our art, for our health (physical and mental), for our vital connection to the landscape around us...and even for those others (children, aging parents, etc.) who depend on us to stay strong and whole.

So here's the path forward for me right now: I am going to be self-full and take some needed time off. Not time off from work, mind you, but the opposite: time to dive deeply into work again -- by taking time off from my Online Life to focus on Life Unplugged.

I'll be back to this blog in approximately two weeks, when I'm a feeling a bit more caught up again, more deeply rooted in the work rhythms of this new season. And when I come back, I'm eager to resume the discussions here that Life Stuff interrupted: more posts in the "Inspiring Women" series; more work-space profiles for the "On Your Desk" series; more sketches and rambles and reading recommendations; more photos of Life in a Devon village, and of a certain bouncy black canine Familiar....

Thank you all for taking the journey with me through the long, rough months of the winter just passed. I look forward to sharing a wildly creative spring and summer with all of you in the Mythic Arts community -- and 'til then, to quote Jane Yolen (as I so often do): "Touch magic, and pass it on."

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The path forward...

I've been back in England for over a week now. Jet-lag has finally diminished, but my intense joy in being home in the Devon hills remains just as strong as ever -- so much so that even the chilly, changeable weather of recent days can't dull my spirits. I've returned to my old practice of beginning each morning in the woods behind the studio, with a notebook and a thermos of coffee close to hand and Tilly the Wonder Dog at my side. (The painting below, by my friend and village neighbor David Wyatt, captures such mornings perfectly...and I should mention that he has many lovely prints for sale, including this one, in his Etsy shop.)

Settling back into my studio, I've been taking blunt stock of the ways that six months of coping with crisis has impacted my working life -- taking a deep breath and facing all of those things that were pushed to the back burner while I was dealing with Scary Life Stuff instead. The length of my "To Do" list is a bit scary in itself, as such lists always are après-crisis -- which is of course precisely the time when, flummoxed by all that you've just been through, what you want is for life to be simple and calm (or else to lie on a hot beach somewhere in the Carribean)...not to have to face the dust and cobwebs covering the negelected life to which you are returning. But as someone who has re-built my life more than once (due to health problems in the past), I know that this small mountain of things I now have to do, although daunting, is actually a very good sign: it's the very last hurdle before normal life resumes. And that's a fine goal indeed.

At least my mountain is made up of largely interesting things: writing and editing work to catch up on, e-book rights and texts to sort out, art commissions to finish for people who have been very, very patient for far too long. I have an Etsy shop to stock up again, a great deal of backed-up correspondence to respond do, and some lovely new projects to plot and plan (which I will tell you more about in due time)...while also finding a proper work/life balance that can support fragile (but strengthening!) health and keep the Muse (and the pooch!) well fed.

I know many of you cope with the same things too: the balancing act that a creative life requires -- balancing work needs and health needs and family needs and the soul's contrary need for both community and solitude. Back around Christmas, I read an article suggesting that the very best gift that one can give to a writer or artist is the precious gift of time...and that's a lovely idea, but I think we also need to be able to give ourselves that gift. For many of us, that means saying shush to the voices (usually inner rather than outer) insisting that others deserve our time more than we do, and that only when everything else is done may we retreat from the world and plunge into our art. Yes, there are times in life when unstinting selflessness is required from each of us...but there are also times when self-fullness (to invent a term that's less loaded than "selfishness") is what is needed most: for our art, for our health (physical and mental), for our vital connection to the landscape around us...and even for those others (children, aging parents, etc.) who depend on us to stay strong and whole.

So here's the path forward for me right now: I am going to be self-full and take some needed time off. Not time off from work, mind you, but the opposite: time to dive deeply into work again -- by taking time off from my Online Life to focus on Life Unplugged.

I'll be back to this blog in approximately two weeks, when I'm a feeling a bit more caught up again, more deeply rooted in the work rhythms of this new season. And when I come back, I'm eager to resume the discussions here that Life Stuff interrupted: more posts in the "Inspiring Women" series; more work-space profiles for the "On Your Desk" series; more sketches and rambles and reading recommendations; more photos of Life in a Devon village, and of a certain bouncy black canine Familiar....

Thank you all for taking the journey with me through the long, rough months of the winter just passed. I look forward to sharing a wildly creative spring and summer with all of you in the Mythic Arts community -- and 'til then, to quote Jane Yolen (as I so often do): "Touch magic, and pass it on."

Myth & Moor

by Terri Windling

I'm a writer, artist, and book editor interested in myth, folklore, fairy tales, and the ways they are used in contemporary arts. I workin the New York publishing industry but I live in alittle village at the edgeof Dartmoor in Devon, England, with my husband, dramatist & puppeteer Howard Gayton, our daughter, Victoria Windling-Gayton, and a joyful hound named Tilly (a Springer Spaniel/Labrador cross).

If you'd like to know more, my publishing bio is here, and my website is here.

“There are some people who live in a dream world,” said Douglas Everett, “and some who face reality; and then there are those who turn one into the other.”

I want to be the latter.

About this blog:

Myth & Moor is a daily journal for musings about art, myth, books, village life, and the world-wide community of folks who create and love Mythic Arts.

The 37th International Conference for the Fantastic in the Arts: I'm delighted to be Guest of Honor in 2016 along with writer Holly Black and fairy tale scholar Cristina Bacchilega. ICFA is held annually in Orlando, Florida in March. Further information on the 37th conference will be posted soon.

Other events in 2015/2016 are still being confirmed, so please check back.

Take a stroll through our village (and its environs) by visiting my neighbors' blogs & sites:

"As a poet I hold the most archaic values on earth...the fertility of the soil, the magic of animals, the power-vision in solitude, the terrifying initiation and rebirth, the love and ecstasy of the dance, the common work of the tribe. I try to hold both history and the wilderness in mind, that my poems may approach the true measure of things and stand against the unbalance and ignorance of our times." - Gary Snyder

"People talk about medium. What is your medium? My medium as a writer has been dirt, clay, sand - what I could touch, hold, stand on, and stand for - Earth. My medium has been Earth. Earth in correspondence with my mind.” - Terry Tempest Williams

"This earth that we live on is full of stories in the same way that, for a fish, the ocean is full of ocean. Some people say when we are born we’re born into stories. I say we’re also born from stories." - Ben Okri

"Everything is held together with stories. That is all that is holding us together, stories and compassion." - Barry Lopez

Bookshelf

The Wood Wife:A mythic novel set in the Sonoran desert of Arizona. This link goes to the US edition; a UK edition is available here; and the new French edition is here. (For those who might be interested, I did a Q-&-A session on the book over on the Good Reads site.) Winner of the Mythopoeic Award.

Welcome to Bordertown:The latest volume in a classic Urban Fantasy series for YA readers. (An Audie Award nominee, for the audio book edition.) For information on the previous books, visit the Bordertown website.)

All told, I've published over forty books for children, teenagers and adults. More information on my writing, editing, and art can be found on my website.

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Please note that these books are linked to Amazon because it's the only book linking system that Typepad (this blogging service) has,but I urge you to please support your local bookstore if you plan to purchase any of the books mentioned on this blog.

Links to:

The Endicott StudioThe nonprofit organization for Mythic Arts that I ran for 22 years (starting in 1986), co-directed with author & folklorist Midori Snyder. The organization is currently on hiatus (while we catch our breaths and make a living), but a great deal of material from our Journal of Mythic Arts archive remains online.

Interstitial ArtsEllen Kushner, Delia Sherman, & other good folk look at writing and art in the interstices between genres. I was one of the founding board members, and remain an enthusiastic supporter.

Brain PickingsI have no connection whatsoever with this inspiring blog by Maria Popova. I list it here because it's my favorite site on the Web, and deserves to be widely known.